There is an overwhelming desire among the general population to protect combat soldiers as far as reasonably possible. Body armor has a significant role to play in protecting soldiers from bullets and shrapnel injuries. Likewise, helmets worn by soldiers help to reduce head injuries. While body armor and helmets reduce injuries to combat soldiers, such items offer very little facial protection against, for example, shrapnel, bullets, and impact injuries of the type that occur in vehicle accidents. Improvised explosive devices (IEDs) are often packed with ball bearings or nails designed to maim and disfigure victims. Thus, there is a need for an armored face guard that works cooperatively with a helmet to help protect a soldier's face from bullets and shrapnel.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,804,829, issued Oct. 19, 2004 to Crye et al., describes a military or police helmet system. The '829 helmet system includes a flexible plastic liner mounted to the wearer's head by a strap assembly. A ballistic shell with a shallow front wall is fastened to the liner and an eye shield assembly is pivotally mounted to the liner for movement between a deployed position and a retracted position between the shell and the liner. The liner has a rear segment connected to a cap segment, with cutout slots which allow the liner to apply pressure to the wearer's neck. A chinstrap is slidable on two stiff side straps, which have curved segments allowing the chinstrap to move with the user's jaw. A protective face guard assembly engages with the liner and has openings covered by resilient sheets, which permit a marksman feel a rifle stock through the face guard.
U.S. Patent Publication No. 2002-0174480 A1, published Nov. 28, 2002 to Lombard, describes a sports helmet. The Lombard helmet includes relatively wide and deep lateral reliefs in the helmet for improved peripheral vision for a person wearing the helmet, while a face guard is formed with a series of closely spaced lateral bars there across for precluding insertion of the fingers or hand therein. The present helmet and face guard are particularly well suited for use in the game of football, but may be adapted for use in other contact sports as well. The present helmet greatly improves safety by providing a wider field of view for a player using the helmet, and the present face guard greatly reduces the opportunity for opposing players to use the face guard for restraining or tackling players, thereby greatly reducing injuries and increasing safety during play.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,857,215, issued Jan. 12, 1999 to Fergason et al., describes a welding helmet having high structural integrity is formed of a single sheet of composite material, such as Kevlar fabric impregnated, with a phenolic thermoset resin; a viewing port in the front of the helmet includes a welding lens is either of fixed or automatically darkening type; and curves, bends, folds and steps in the composite material and trim pieces in the viewing port area and about the peripheral rim of the helmet shell provide additional stiffening for the helmet. A method of making a welding helmet of a single sheet of composite material includes pre-forming the composite material to a shape similar to that of the finished molding helmet shape, and placing the pre-shaped composite material in a compression mold and closing the mold to mold the composite material to shape while curing the composite material by applying heat other otherwise assisting in the curing of the composite material; and mounting a welding lens in a viewing port of the welding helmet.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,026,510, issued Feb. 22, 2000 to Kocher, describes a “bullet deflection, fighting position body armor”. The '510 patent describes a bullet defeat mechanism approach which is said to be different than conventional armor's objective of stopping bullets. The '510 patent describes a method that relies on providing concave and convex channels to a ballistic plate for protecting a person in the line of fire.
None of the above inventions and patents, taken either singly or in combination, is seen to describe the instant invention as claimed.